Posts Tagged ‘illumination’

Last time I wrote about my interest in trying to figure out what compels me to paint and what drives me as an artist. Is it merely the sensual stimulation and enjoyment I gain from manipulating the brush and color? Or could it be some egotistical need to compete with and attempt to enhance nature’s glory? Or am I driven by a desire to share with others my perceptions of those subjects that interest me? Or is it a combination of things that impels me toward some greater, overriding purpose?

I have practiced art from the time I was quite young. Whether the drawings were any good, and whether my color choices had any basis in reality, or were simply a response to what I thought they should be, was largely immaterial. The point was that I was interested in trying to depict subjects that appealed to me. It was a way of investigating and trying to more fully understand and appreciate the world around me.

As I got a little older, I tended to stay quiet, with “eyes and ears open and mouth shut,” as my Dad used to put it. I watched people. I looked at the lines of their bodies as they moved around, the way their facial features were shaped, and how the texture of their skin reflected light in different ways at different ages. (It may be just as well that my classmates had no clue about what I was thinking; it definitely could have been misinterpreted!)

In a way, I suppose that’s what I’m still doing—studying, trying to understand and appreciate subjects that interest me. And such intangible qualities as light, color, line, and pattern are at least as important subjects in my work today as the physical subjects that act as vehicles for exploring them.

Now that I recognize what my subject matter really is, I look forward to growing in that knowledge. I trust it will free me to explore it further, becoming less concerned with objects as subjects and more concerned with those revealing qualities that drew my attention to those objects.